Chain letter dismay?

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LE

One of my son's 'friends' is happily passing on these chain e-letters via email which are quite vile. Fortunately I intercepted it. Anybody else come across these 'nasties'? What's your best and wisest advice?

Text below:

wHEN U ALREADY START READING THIS DONT STOP OR ELSE SUMTHIN BAD WILL HAPPEN.... READ ON TO FIND OUT WHAT.... AND DONT TRY TO JUST DELETE THIS MESSAGE NOW CAUSE I ALREADY KNOW WHO YOU ARE AND WHERE YOU LIVE.... SO LET ME INTRODUCE MYSELF........... MY NAME IS SUMMER...I AM 15 YEARS OLD WITH BLONDE HAIR AND BLOOD SHOT EYES. I HAVE NO NOSE OR EARS. I AM DEAD. IF U DO NOT SEND THIS TO 15 PPL IN THE NEXT 5 MIN., I WILL APPEAR TONIGHT UNDER YOUR BED, YOU WILL HEAR ME.... AND SEE ME FOR ONLY A SECOND....... BUT WITH MY KNIFE..... I WILL KILL YOU. THIS IS NO JOKE.......... SOMETHING GOOD WILL HAPPEN TO U TONIGHT AT 10:22 IF YOU SEND THIS TO 15 PPL. SOMEONE WILL CALL U OR TALK TO U ONLINE AND SAY I LOVE U. DON'T FORWARD... COPY AND PASTE......... THIS IS NOT A JOKE

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"As we moved slowly through the outskirts of the town we passed row after row of little grey slum houses running at right angles to the embankment. At the back of one of the houses a young woman was kneeling on the stones, poking a stick up the leaden waste-pipe which ran from the sink inside and which I suppose was blocked. I had time to see everything about her - her sacking apron, her clumsy clogs, her arms reddened by the cold. She looked up as the train passed, and I was almost near enough to catch her eye." Orwell, The Road to Wigan Pier

Gullibility seems to be ageless though - just thought of Orson Welle's War of the Worlds radio programme that had Americans (Yes!) packing and leaving home:Orson Welles

"As we moved slowly through the outskirts of the town we passed row after row of little grey slum houses running at right angles to the embankment. At the back of one of the houses a young woman was kneeling on the stones, poking a stick up the leaden waste-pipe which ran from the sink inside and which I suppose was blocked. I had time to see everything about her - her sacking apron, her clumsy clogs, her arms reddened by the cold. She looked up as the train passed, and I was almost near enough to catch her eye." Orwell, The Road to Wigan Pier

Yes it does, but then when you call them reporting a break in or an assault you'll know why they don't turn up straight away, 'cos people report stuff like this instead of taking a copy of the email around to the kids parents themselves or something equally as sensible.

But no, report it to the police, then when they arrive tell them 'No, I don't want my kid to give a statement or go to court or anything that would actually help. Can't you just use your magical police powers to make the world a better place?'

Deep breath and relax....

Is it safe?

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. Martin Luther King.

LE

It is a clear threat to kill and criminal designed to operate on a young mind and is intended to be believed and may, in fact be believed by it's recipient. Although I note you have intercepted it before he has had a chance to read it!

It may also fall within Section 1 Malicious Communication Act 1988 punishable by a level four fine for an offence of sending letters, etc with intent to cause distress or anxiety.

Moreover, a recently decided case under the Civil law gave an individual an actionable right to seek injunctive relief and damages for malicious communication placed on a chat room.

In other words, the individual responsible may find himself guilty of one or more criminal offences and may well be held liable for the commission of a tort under the civil law. Criminal proceedings for which he is found guilty being admissible in evidence in the recovery of damages should the victim of it decide to take civil proceedings.

Such nasties operate only on the mind, and may in some circumstances lead to psychological harm.

Depending on the age and character of the recipient, they may be ignored and not passed on. However, It may be an idea to bring them to the attention of the Police where the recipient is young or vulnerable!

As you are a parent with clear concerns for your son, and as you have described the sender as 'one of your son's friends' and thus presumably identifiable and a potential victim of an honestly held fear himself, my advice would be to report it to the Police!

I personally believe that internet providers should be more pro-active in this area. You may wish to submit a complaint to them since the sender may well have contractually breached the conditions under which he is allowed to use it!

I congratulate you for trying to responsibly draw the right balance between your son's privacy and exercising your duty of care as a parent. Not always an easy task!

Good luck in whatever decision you take.

Regards and best wishes
Iolis

"When Plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men in a society, over the course of time they create for themselves a legal system that authorises it and a moral code that glorifies it."

War Hero

As boomshackerlacker has already said one of his 'friends' is messing about with chain letter.

To the ones screaming 'ring the police, ring the police' I hope you remember this when your kid's teacher rings to let you know your child has been locked up for assault after he/she pushed someone over in the playground.

Is it safe?

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. Martin Luther King.

LE

To the ones screaming 'ring the police, ring the police' I hope you remember this when your kid's teacher rings to let you know your child has been locked up for assault after he/she pushed someone over in the playground.

I don't think that informing the police would be the way forwards. I merely asked whether sending the e-mail was a crime, in the hope that someone (I say someone, I was hoping Iolis) would give me a nice long complicated answer.

With respect to your last point, I'm 19. I'm hoping that by the time I've had kids this whole 'Suing everybody, everything is an infringement on my human rights' business will have blown over, and those in charge will be looking sheepishly at their feet trying to pretend the whole thing never happened.

....It could happen...

I owe Dale four favours, now I know how Han Solo felt when Bobba Fett was on his case.
Personally I preferred the grooming sessions.

LE

The information for which advice has been requested is not "Messing around with chain letters". "or pushing a kid over in the playground"

The first paragraph of the post suggests a reqularity in a course of conduct which the poster as the custodian of the facts he discloses describes as 'vile' and from the available facts it may reasonably be inferred that others have been affected and who may not have been as fortunate to have had such mail intercepted.

The decision whether or not to call in the Police will depend upon the nature of the communication sent' the regularity with which it engaged in and the effect upon the recipients of it!

In other words, if if is regular, widespread and vile then it is right that the Police should be called and it would be wrong to trivialise it if such is the case!

The decision to call the the Police will lie with the parent. The decision as to whether or not to investigate it will lie with the Police.

"When Plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men in a society, over the course of time they create for themselves a legal system that authorises it and a moral code that glorifies it."

I should have clarified by saying that the email has come from someone in my son's school. Placing the word friend in inverted commas was meant to indicate a so called friend who has obtained my son's email and added it to her email distribution list. Their identity remains uncertain.

On one level I accept this should be dismissed as a childish prank. But the content is malevolent. I would be dismayed if a) my son had read this and b) he'd felt a compulsion to pass it on.

I am tempted to delete it but the Internet enables this message to be spread widely. If just one child receives this unsolicited message and who has an emotional disposition that leaves them genuinely fearful that is more than a shame and it stops being a prank. Children develop at different rates and not all are hardened street urchins.

Because children won't self regulate their use of the Internet I think parents should control email and Internet strictly.

"As we moved slowly through the outskirts of the town we passed row after row of little grey slum houses running at right angles to the embankment. At the back of one of the houses a young woman was kneeling on the stones, poking a stick up the leaden waste-pipe which ran from the sink inside and which I suppose was blocked. I had time to see everything about her - her sacking apron, her clumsy clogs, her arms reddened by the cold. She looked up as the train passed, and I was almost near enough to catch her eye." Orwell, The Road to Wigan Pier

War Hero

I noticed on the letter it says that something good will happen to you at 1022 (2222, if you please) if the letter is forwarded...something good happens to me around 2222 most nights so who needs chain letters?

LE

You should bring this to the attention of the school.
You should attempt to ID the culprit and speak to his/her parents.
You should get your son to create a new internet name for himself.
You should sit him down and tell him that such chain letters are junk, not real, and to disregard/bring to your attention any future chain letters.

If you want to, you could hit reply and send the culprit a stern warning that any future similar emails will result in legal action.

Guests are requested not to feed the vampires.

I am gross and perverted.
Im obsessed and deranged.
I have existed for years but very little has changed.
Im the best you can get, have you guessed me yet?

MIA

Sadly the motherfucker who started the chain has cleverly covered his tracks and witch hunting is going to gain nobody anything. By instructing the poor sap to copy and paste rather than forward, all the raw e-mail information that you never see has cunningly been lost.

Sadly, being sat at work, my e-mail engine is Lotus Notes so what I am about to demonstrate will not be typical: Outlook and Thunderbird users must find their own route to the raw page source I am going to show.

What is sent as E-mail consists of a lot more than you will see when you display it in a mail reader. If you visit your reader and select an e-mail, any e-mail, there will be an option (in Notes it is View / Show / Page source, though it seems only to give useful information on external e-mails) which will display the entire e-mail in all its glory. This morning I got an e-mail news feed. Viewed normally it starts like this:

What the top of this mail is showing is the route the e-mail has taken (latest at the top) through all the servers it has passed through all the way back to where the e-mail came from (in the example, look at the tag:From: pcpro.newsletter@dennisnet.co.uk (PC Pro Newsletter) )

When you forward an e-mail, you forward all of these data. This is why the number of bytes in a much-forwarded e-mail is rather bigger than the number of characters you see on the screen.

However, by copy and pasting the e-mail instead of forwarding it, the only page source available for detection is that of the poor sap who fell for it before you did.

The twat who started it needs a good going over, but sadly in this case he has been clever enough to save himself from it.

Be that a lesson to you all: when you forward e-mail, you forward a lot more than you think you do. Copy and paste is a good security aid.

LE

Sadly the motherfucker who started the chain has cleverly covered his tracks and witch hunting is going to gain nobody anything. By instructing the poor sap to copy and paste rather than forward, all the raw e-mail information that you never see has cunningly been lost.

...in the absence of electronic tracking it looks like the Police will have to resort to their well tried and old fashioned DixonofDockGreen methods cherished by cherry-cheeked bobbies on the beat: ...a good clip round the lughole followed by thumbscrews, sleep depravation and stress positions. Who mentioned the Sweeney earlier?

"As we moved slowly through the outskirts of the town we passed row after row of little grey slum houses running at right angles to the embankment. At the back of one of the houses a young woman was kneeling on the stones, poking a stick up the leaden waste-pipe which ran from the sink inside and which I suppose was blocked. I had time to see everything about her - her sacking apron, her clumsy clogs, her arms reddened by the cold. She looked up as the train passed, and I was almost near enough to catch her eye." Orwell, The Road to Wigan Pier